Condo Media - September 2016 - 30

AGE-OLD QUESTIONS
'A SLOW, INSIDIOUS PROCESS'
"Aging is a slow, insidious process,"
notes Ellen Hirsch de Haan, a partner in Florida-based Wetherington
Hamilton and a nationally recognized
expert on the problems of aging in condominium communities. The changes
are incremental, the perception of them
often lagging their impact. The 80-yearold may feel no differently than he did
at 50, but odds are his reaction times
are slower, his eyesight less sharp, and
his balance less perfect. The uneven
sidewalks unnoticed by 30-somethings
become serious trip and fall hazards for
seniors and potential liability risks for
the association.
"The association's obligation to
maintain the common areas is the same
regardless of the age of residents," notes
de Haan, who is also a past CAI president and a member of the College of
Community Association Lawyers. "But
the liability risks increase as the popu-

lation ages, because older residents are
more susceptible to being injured."
Older residents are also more likely
than younger ones to request special
"accommodations" to address the physical limitations impeding their mobility.
Scott Eriksen, a partner in the Massachusetts law firm Perkins & Anctil,
P.C., says one of his association clients
received three separate requests in as
many months from residents seeking
wheelchair accessible ramps leading to
their front doors. An owner in another
community recently asked the association to install grab-bars on common area
walkways.
FAIR HOUSING REQUIREMENTS
The Fair Housing Act requires associations to approve "reasonable accommodations" for residents with physical or
emotional handicaps. But the federal law
doesn't require the community to pay for
those improvements. (The Massachusetts

Fair Housing Act may require associations to pay for common area modifications, but only if they are "reasonable"
and won't create an undue financial hardship for the community.) "Just because a
condominium community's population
is aging doesn't [automatically] mean it
has to renovate its buildings [to accommodate them]," de Haan emphasizes.
But if many owners require handrails,
ramps, or other modifications, or will
need them in the foreseeable future, the
association might want to make those
modifications an association expense,
Eriksen suggests. Persuading owners to
approve the expenditures could be challenging, however.
Younger owners, who don't envision themselves growing older, may
resist expenditures for improvements they perceive as benefiting
only older residents. On the other
hand, they may be more inclined than
older owners to embrace major capi-

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Condo Media - September 2016

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